The present invention concerns an assembly process of electrodes in an insulating material and, more particularly, a self-clamping process for electrodes used in miniature relays.
The development of installations equipped with electronic equipment mounted on printed circuit boards as well as the need of electromechanical relays in the same installations have led to a new catagory of miniature relays which may be mounted on such boards without by this modifying the assembly pitch of the boards. One of these relays has been the object of the French patent application No. 77 03768 filed on Feb. 10, 1977 in the name of CGCT and entitled "Relais miniaturise embrochable" (Pluggable miniature relay).
There are two different ways of mounting this relay on a printed circuit board: either directly or after plugging-in on a socket connector itself mounted on the board used as connection support. Due to both assembly versions, it is not possible to use in all cases the same parts to ensure the relay external electric connection. Moreover, instead of having, e.g., different contact springs, not only according to the contact combination but according to the mode of assembly on the printed circuit board, the contact springs are standardized and there have been provided two types of intermediate parts--or electrodes--which are associated, on the one hand, to the contact springs and present, on the other hand, a configuration enabling the direct connection to the printed circuit board or the plugging-in on the socket connector.
But if the contact springs may be, for example, soldered to their respective electrodes--these electrodes having the configuration compatible with the mode of assembly onto the printed circuit board--nevertheless, the problem raised by the anchoring of the assemblies constituted by the electrodes and the contact springs exists. This anchoring is made on the relay support itself and it is generally tricky due to the miniaturization of the parts concerned, to the use of intermediate fixing (anchoring) means and to the need of a rigid anchoring means which can be automatized.